Falling spring, a guide, .50. -- Thomas Jeffersons Memorandum Book, August 13, 1818..Brightly lustrous, with lovely satiny character in the fields of both obverse and reverse. Most of the surfaces have developed an even tone of faint gold, though the rims are ringed with attractive pale blue. Detail is excellent throughout, and the overdate is particularly visible on this Large 8 die, even without the benefit of magnification. Some fine hairlines are present on both sides, and examination will also find a light abrasion on a diagonal from the highest point of star 1 to the field parallel to Libertys lips. A short scratch below the ear to the neck curl is well hidden, and no other significant marks are seen. A small and natural spot is present above the eagles beak. Struck from an interesting die state of this marriage, this obverse is now in its second use following its debut in Overton-101. A die crack arcs from Libertys bosom across her shoulder and hair to star 11 and the rim beyond. A short crack extends vertically from the denticles left of the date, and a tiny piece has chipped off the reverse die below RI of AMERICA. Several stars are drawn to the rim. Evidence from a die clash remains at the central obverse, where an impression of the reverse shield is seen, but the fields have been polished, leaving no clashing traces behind but showing areas of frost where those traces once were.One of only a small number of Mint State survivors known of this variety, which is rarer than the Overton-102 Small 8 variety in all grades. Most Large 8 1818/7 half dollars are from the more common Overton-101 marriage, which shares this obverse die, and undoubtedly most of the entries of Mint State specimens certified by PCGS under their Large 8 category represent that variety rather than this one. The Overton-Parsley census lists just two coins from these dies graded better than MS-63.In August 1818, Thomas Jefferson travelled west from Monticello to sit on the Rockfish Gap Commission, along with then-President James Monroe, former President James Madison, Chief Justice John Marshall, and other notable Virginians. After the commission accomplished its goal of selecting a site for a new public university for the Commonwealth, the 75-year-old Jefferson continued into the mountains to visit several mineral baths near Warm Springs, Virginia. On August 13, Jefferson hired a local guide for a half dollar to visit a waterfall on Falling Spring Creek. The short trip took Jefferson, whose visionary Louisiana Purchase acquisition in 1803 had helped to cement his legacy as the Father of the American West, within approximately seven miles of the modern West Virginia state line, marking the westernmost extent of his world travels. Two months later, an Anglo-American treaty yielded an agreement on joint occupation of the Oregon Country and a border set upon the 49th parallel from the Lake of the Woods to the Rocky Mountains, codifying American claims first made by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark.
